Taz (Looney Tunes)

The Tasmanian Devil, commonly referred to as Taz, is an animated cartoon character featured in the Warner Bros. "Looney Tunes" and "Merrie Melodies" series of cartoons. Though the character appeared in only five shorts before Warner Bros. Cartoons closed down in 1964, marketing and television appearances later propelled the character to new popularity in the 1990s.

Personality

Taz is generally portrayed as a ferocious albeit dim-witted omnivore with a notoriously short temper and little patience. His enormous appetite seems to know no bounds, as he will eat anything in his path. He is best known for his speech consisting mostly of grunts, growls, and rasps (in his earlier appearances, he does speak English with primitive grammar) as well as his ability to spin like a vortex and bite through just about anything. Taz does have one weakness: he can be calmed by almost any music. While in this calm state, he can be easily dealt with.

In 1991, Taz got his own show, Taz-Mania, which ran for four seasons, in which Taz was the protagonist.

Tarsame Singh Saini

Taz Stereo Nation aka Taz (Stereo Nation) born 23 May 1967, Coventry, West Midlands, United Kingdom), is a British singer, composer and actor of Indian descent. He is the lead singer of the pop band Stereo Nation which was formed in 1996. Formerly known as Johnny Zee, he is credited with being the pioneer of cross-cultural Asian fusion music.

Career

He first hit the charts in 1989 with the album "Hit the Deck" which spent over 36 weeks on the UK Asian pop charts at number one. The album was produced by the former vocalist in The Specials, Neville Staple. He went on to produce many albums in the 1990s and early 2000s which were hugely successful. To date, all but two of his albums have received gold platinum and multi-platinum discs. His most successful album to date is "Slave II Fusion", released in 2000, which includes many of his most well-known hit songs including "Pyar Ho Gaya", "Nachenge Saari Raat", and "Gallan Gorian". His music videos also feature actors before they became famous. His video "Ishq" features model and actress Koena Mitra and "Pyar Ho Gaya" features actor Shiny Ahuja.

Tazz

Peter Senerchia (born October 11, 1967) is an American radio presenter, former color commentator, and former professional wrestler, best known under his ring name Taz. He also worked for Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA), where he was a color commentator for their television and pay-per-view events.

He is best known from his tenure in Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW), where he was a two time World Heavyweight Champion, a two time World Television Champion, a three time World Tag Team Champion, a two time (and the inaugural) FTW Heavyweight Champion, and the fourth ECW Triple Crown Champion.

His World Wrestling Federation/Entertainment (WWF/E) career as an in-ring performer came to an early end in 2002, when mounting injuries forced him to retire and subsequently saw him transition into a color commentary role, which he continued to do until his contract with WWE expired in April 2009. Two months later, Senerchia debuted in Total Nonstop Action Wrestling at their Victory Road pay-per-view under his original Taz ring name and eventually reprised his role as a color commentator for TNA's broadcasts, replacing Don West.

Taz (video game)

Taz was released by Atari in 1983 for the Atari 2600 and features the Looney Tunes character the Tasmanian Devil in a food frenzy. Within the game, Taz only appears as a tornado. The same game was released outside the United States featuring Asterix instead of Taz.

Gameplay

The player guides Taz between the stage lines in order to eat hamburgers and avoid the dynamites. The game does not use any buttons and the difficulty increases by increasing the speed of the objects on screen. As the game progresses, the burgers may change into other edible or drinkable objects such as beer kegs, hot dogs, etc. There are not many sound effects in the game except a blipping sound when the player hits an edible object and another sound that resembles of explosion when the player hits dynamite.

References

Tafazzin

Tafazzin is a protein that in humans is encoded by the TAZ gene. Tafazzin is highly expressed in cardiac and skeletal muscle. It is involved in the metabolism of cardiolipin.

Tafazzin functions as a phospholipid-lysophospholipid transacylase.

Pathology

The mutation of the tafazzin gene is associated with a number of clinical disorders including Barth syndrome (BTHS) (type II 3-Methylglutaconic aciduria), dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), hypertrophic DCM, endocardial fibroelastosis, and left ventricular noncompaction (LVNC). Tafazzin is responsible for remodeling of a phospholipid cardiolipin (CL), the signature lipid of the mitochondrial inner membrane. As a result, BTHS patients exhibit defects in CL metabolism, including aberrant CL fatty acyl composition, accumulation of monolysocardiolipin (MLCL) and reduced total CL levels.

History

The protein was identified by Italian scientists Silvia Bione et al. in 1996. Owing to the complex procedure required for the identification of tafazzin, the protein was named after "Tafazzi", a masochistic comic character in an Italian television show.